Review: A Gay Jar Jar in New "Star Wars" Movie

Ziro the Hutt, Truman Capote

Oh, Lordy, what were they thinking?

There’s a stereotypically “gay”-seeming villain in the new CGI Star Wars movie The Clone Wars that is so offensive and over-the-top that you’re left wondering, “Is George Lucas insane?” This is especially true in light of the widespread criticism the man received for characters perceived as racist in The Phantom Menace: the Caribbean simpleton Jar Jar Binks, scheming “Asian menace”-like characters, and stereotypically Jewish-seeming tightwads.

And rest assured, Ziro the Hutt, the gay-seeming character in The Clone Wars, is entirely the work of Lucas himself. Press reports have director Dave Filoni recounting how the character previously sounded completely different, “then George one day was watching it and said ‘I want him to sound like Truman Capote.’”

Jar Jar Binks, Watto, Nute Gunray

Hutt sounds exactly like Truman Capote — one of the most famous openly gay men of all time — who spoke with a lisping southern accent. But unlike Capote, Ziro also wears make-up, feathers, jewelry, and is covered in body tattoos. Whenever he appears, it’s in purple shadows with an undertone of languid, sex-infused jazz playing in the background of the nightclub he manages.

He’s also a villain through and through: a scheming traitor willing to kill even a child without thought. But like so many gay-seeming villains before him, he’s also a pathetic coward, losing all dignity at the first hint of the collapse of his nefarious plot.

To be fair, the character of Ziro the Hutt is small, with just a couple of scenes. And at no point does the movie come right out and say he is gay, but it is almost impossible to read him any other way. And it’s noteworthy that in Lucas’ entire Star Wars oeuvre of seven full-length feature films (and various other TV incarnations), there has never been a living gay character until this one, which falls right in line with the long tradition of Hollywood's use of gender-nonconformity to make the audience feel discomfort, even revulsion, with a villainous character.

It’s the same old story: gay people don’t seem to exist except as coded gay villains, especially in science fiction universes.

It’s particularly disappointing that this character is in a movie that seems aimed squarely at kids. A spin-off series will debut October third on the Cartoon Network. What a horrible message to deliver to young people: those who don’t conform to traditional gender norms are evil, disgusting cowards.

I always thought the Star Wars universe and Lucas himself deserved major kudos for the robot character of C3PO. Yes, he was a fussy, cowardly character, played with a prissy, often annoying voice. But the character was ultimately endearing — one of the very few characters Hollywood has ever created where an effeminate character is not portrayed as an object of derision or revulsion. This was an especially courageous move given that the primary audience of Star Wars was probably teenage boys.

George Lucas, C3PO

Photo credit: Getty Images/Frazer Harrison/WireImage/Jeffrey Mayer/ Getty/Images/Frazer Harrison

The movie itself? Don’t ask. Lucas left any trace of wit, intelligence, or fun back in the original three Star Wars movies and has been operating on the sheer momentum from the creative explosion that was that original trilogy ever since. There’s nothing remotely approximating the genius that is a light saber or the whole concept of The Force in any in the three “prequels” or in this latest movie.

The only reason to see The Clone Wars is to marvel at the colossally bad judgment that led to Ziro the Hutt. But trust me, that definitely isn’t reason enough.